Metal step



Patented Aug. 7, 1928.

UNITED STATES HAB-RY T. ANDERSON, OF BUTLER, PENNSYLVANIA, ASSIGNOR TO T-Z RAILWAY,

1,680,032 PATENT OFFICE.

EQUIPMENT CO., OF CIIICAGO, ILLINOIS, A. CORPORATION OF ILLINOIS.

METAL STEP.

Application mea April 25,

This invention relates to metal steps used on railway cars, out-of-door stairways and the like wherein there is always the problem of insuring safety in all kinds of weather for a person placing his foot upon the step.

The object of the invention is to provide a step whichis easily and cheaply constructible; which is satisfactory in use and not readily liable to get out of order; which is always substantially free from ice and the like at the points on the step engaged by the foot of the user.

The invention consists in providing on the` upper or tread surface of the ste sharpened projections which engage the s oe'ofthe person carried by the step, said projections being so constructed and arranged that there is drainage on all sides of the projections through adjacent perforations in the step, thereby reducing to a minimum the chances of the portion of the step engaged bythe shoe of the user being in any way sli pery and therefore dangerous.

he invention further consists in numerous features and details of construction which will be hereaftenmore lfully set forth in the specification and claims.

Referring to the drawings in which like numerals designate the same parts throughout the several views:

Figure 1 is a plan view of a step illustrating this invention in its preferred form.

Figure 2 is a side elevation taken from the right hand end of Figure 1.

Figure 3 is an enlarged .perspective view of a part of anti-slipping devices on the step of this invention.

Figure et is a perspective view looking more nearly vertically downward than the view of Figure 3.

Figure 5 is a. sectional side view on the line 5-5 of Figure 4.-

Figure 6 is a corresponding view on the line 6-6 of Figure 4.

The step of this invention is described as a metal step and under present known conditions will ordinarily be made of that material but any other material capable of construction and use as here described may be substituted without departing from this invention.

The step of this invention is ordinarily a metal plate 1() supported on brackets 12 'or the like attached by any suitable means,

as, for instance, screws or bolts 14, to thel 1927. Serial Nq. 136,253.

wall 16 of any adjacent object in connection wlth which the step is necessary equipment. This may be a railway car, an automobile, the side of a building or anything else.

The step 10 is in the case here illustrated permanently secured to the brackets 12 by rivets or the like 18. The step is, in the par ticular case here illustrated provided with an upwardly turned rear flange 2O adjacent to the wall 16 and a downwardly turned front flange 22 extending over the extreme polnts 24 of the brackets 12.

In order to prevent Versons mounting the step 10 from slipping t ereon, the tread face of the step is provided with' a multiplicity of short parallel cuts or gashes 26 leaving between them a central body of material 28 whose adjacent edges 30g, are stamped upwardly, as clearly shown in Figure 6,130 make comparatively sharp shoe engaging points or lines on opposite sides of an intervening curved surface 32.' The severed portions of material 34 immediately adjacent to the edges 30, just described, and on opposite sides of the slits or cuts 26 are, as

clearly shown in Figure 6, bent downward so as to form downwardly inclined drainage surfaces 36 over which water or other liquid collected on the curved surface 32 and on the adjacent flat surfaces 38 of the step 10 may pass, thereby insuring that the upwardly pointed shoe engaging edges 30 are, for all practical purposes, always free of water and snow when the shoe of the operator comes in contact with them. As to snow, this last statement is true in the sense that the points lor lines 30 being sharp, any ice which may be at the extreme points, when the shoe of the operator engages them, will be instantly4 crushed and t ereby removed under the weight of the person whose foot is sustained on these points. The statement as to water is literally true because any water touching the points or lines 30 `will instantly drain. off, first to the surface 32 and thence aroundthe ends of the slots 26 to the inclined drainage surfaces 36 heretofore described.`

By providing the surface of step 10 with a multiplicity of groups of upwardly turned devices 30--3230, a step on which the user may step without danger of slipping is, for all practical purposes, provided and one which is much safer and more satisfactory in use than prior known devices.

Having thus described my invention, what Iclaim as new and desire to secure by Letters Patent is:

1. As an article of manufacture, a normally horizontal step havin -a tread surface provided -with a multip city of pairs of shorty adjacent slots the step material between each pair of'siots bein upturned, the

material on the opposite si es of the slots" downturned to form drainage openings' as escrbed said upturned portion being shaped'to provide a transversely extending, curvilinear de ression. A 'y 2. As an article of manufacture, a normally horizontal step havin a. tread surface provided with a multip icity` of pairs of short adjacent slots, the materiell' on the opposite sides of the slots bein down-turned to form drainage o enings, t e surface between the upturne portions being shaped lmaterial on the opposite curvilinear in both horizontal and transveree N In witness whereof, I have hereunto subul scribed my name,

HARRY T. ANDERSON. 

